The Poetry and Music Window in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, by
W. F. Dixon

Lower two lights of the "Poetry
and Music" window in the former entrance hall of the Rijksmuseum,
Amsterdam, by W. F. Dixon (1847-1928). These lights show Joost
van den Vondel (1587-1679), the Dutch poet and playwright, and Jan
Pieterszoon Sweelinck (1562-1621), the Dutch composer and musician.
Both men are prominent cultural icons of the Golden Age, and both are
particularly associated with Amsterdam. Vondelpark there is named
after the former, and Sweelinck was for many years the organist of the
Oude Kirk, Amsterdam, where he is buried (not very far from the
museum).

The upper two lights of the
window, showing scenes of reciting and playing to an audience: the
right-hand side features a man with a double bass, an instrument
developed in the fifteenth century.

The museum's early guidebook notes that the stained glass in the
hall is "not from the hands of a Hollander" (28). Dixon must have had
to do a great deal of historical research to create all these figures
in their period costumes, and mostly from a different culture. The
windows are a remarkable achievement, and his name deserves to be
better remembered, especially in view of all the praise recently (and
deservedly) lavished on the recent restoration of the
Rijjksmuseum.

Photographs and accompanying text by Jacqueline Banerjee. The
photographs are reproduced here by kind permission of the Rijksmuseum.
Click on the images for larger pictures.